I've pointed out before the lack of publicly available rail data. I really want to know how many other urban centers have as much oil moving by rail through them as Pittsburgh does these days. If someone has a data source to answer that, please let me know.

I have no idea whether similar data access is an issue on this side of the state, but it sure is curious there have been no comparable media stories on rail data here as best I can tell. It actually seemed pretty hard for our media friends to get officials to even admit there was any oil traveling by rail through the city at all. See this from May 29, 2014: "However, a state official said Bakken crude does come through Pittsburgh on the way to Philadelphia". Talk about pulling teeth and stating the obvious.

It turns out this all may be a passing phenomenon. Some have speculated that a second order effect of the collapse of world oil prices may be to decrease the incentive to bring North Dakota oil to east coast refineries. I think the argument is that it may now be more competitive to again import oil directly from overseas and shipped in via tankers. We will see how that works out.

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What is really bad is that reports say that these rail cars were of new standards that were supposed to be safer. The trains that go through population centers are supposed to be at reduced speeds but I doubt that that is very much safer.